DAY 162: The Blame Game & How to Not Be Lame

In a recent chat with a friend I saw myself playing the blame card - a card that I thought it was no longer in circulation - and an interesting process started to unfold in relation to the pattern of blame. Often times challenging conversations become great gifts in our process of self-expansion but the treasure hidden underneath the shaking waters can be easily missed when the tendency is to try to forget about it, to ignore the inner conflict and finally blame the other person for whatever is going on inside. I tried holding on to this card for some time but it was pointless - everything within me was (still is) showing me the need to slow down and understand what is happening. So let me once and for all investigate the Blame Game within me and share some of my realisations that may support others as well.

The first element that I want to explore is the "blind spot of blame", which is the inability to see that my words towards another carry blame. There is this rush of putting words out without realising that these words (written or spoken) carry feelings and emotions towards another. This blindness not only disregards the impact that my words may have unto another, but it also means that I ignore taking responsibility for the thoughts that exist in my own mind, now thrown unto another like a basketball game. I would actually call this emotional blame as a cry for help, but it is often received as a shout that puts others away.

Why do I say that blame is a cry for help? Because it is a projection of something that is going on within ourselves. Be LAME, according to the dictionary is the inability to walk without difficulty as the result of an injury; it is to be incomplete, feebly and weak.

Obviously if another person is unaware of this the whole conversation will escalate into unnecessary separation but, if this is done with someone also willing to walk this process in self-honesty then the journey gets very, very interesting. The gift of bringing blame back to self is the journey that I am walking now - after many years of playing this game that I decided to stop.

On the tube today, the chapter that I was reading on "Further Along The Road Less Travelled" was exactly about blame (no coincidence hein) and it says that the only way to stop blame is to stop. Well, based on my experience this stopping needs to happen both physically - as in taking a deep breath and stopping my current participation in the conversation from the starting point of blaming another, but also mentally by not allowing the thoughts of blame to keep running wild in my mind.

Ask yourself: How many times did I blame another for the feelings I experienced inside? And did it ever help me? Did it help me to understand what was going on WITH ME? The answer is no.

It is apparently easier to blame another than to take responsibility for my own self, my own thoughts, my own reactions and my own self-disappointment. It takes a decision to slow down and to be brutally self-honest. What does this mean? Firstly, it means that I am open with myself to see the truth of me. Secondly, it is the awareness that whatever I am projecting unto another is a point that exists within me and that I am responsible for bringing back to myself. This has been tougher than I thought... How can I bring back to myself a point that I am not yet aware of? It is a process. As I allow myself to see, more points open within me to see and get to know myself further.

In the recent experience I was  blaming another for what I was feeling and experiencing inside me for not being supported enough, understood or cared for. So here I ask myself: where am I not supporting MYSELF enough, understanding MYSELF enough, and caring for MYSELF enough? Why do I expect to receive this sort of support from another and therefore react when I don't get what I believe I need?

Looking back in past situations where blame was a prominent blockage, I did not allow me to be responsible for the points that I was projecting - so what have I been avoiding to give ME? To Realize about ME? To change within ME?

So the blame reaction is a defense mechanism hindering me from investigating and understanding something about me. It is the realisation that the other is not the one triggering these experiences within me - I was the one creating this experience to sabotage a moment of self-expansion.

My starting point in the conversation was to get some sort of freedom, to let go of the relationship, to have a break from it. Now, considering that my relationships with others are a mirror of the relationship I have with myself, I ask myself the question: - What is it in my life that I feel stuck in and I want badly to break away from?

When I didn't get what I thought I needed, I reacted and I blamed the other for not caring about me or understanding me. I even blamed another for not giving me the peace that I asked for. But which peace is this? How can I blame another for taking my peace away when in fact it was this lack of peace within me that triggered the conflict in the first place?

The idea of freedom and release that I was hoping to get from another was a projection of the freedom and release that I wanted to have from my own mind, from the constant thoughts, the same situations, the inner conflicts, fears, thoughts, habits and behaviour.

I understand now that when my relationship with myself is of lame, whereby I feel incomplete and unsure about what I want for myself, the tendency is to look for someone outside of me to guide me - because this is how we have been educated (look up to family, friends, partners and god). When the response from the other side is the opposite of what we wanted (freedom, space, let go), the lame within is projected unto another in the form of blame. The apparatus can be such that the attention shifts completely from self to "the other".

The key is to be able to identify the underlying experience out of which the blame reaction came about; the reaction with others simply becomes the external manifestation of what is going on inside and that we still try to hide from our own selves. It is not to blame pre-programming or wonder about it when things happen or open up. Rather approach it as: Okay, what's my responsibility and response-ability within it?

So the journey through the blame game shows me who/what I have been accepting to be and do, and it holds a decision to either stop and see, or turn a blind-eye (I) feeding the emotion of blame to blind me even more. A heads-up is that the same situation will happen again and again until I see what I am doing, so why postpone? What is there more for me to see and be? Wasn't' the dissatisfaction that led me to wanting the breakthrough and created this whole spiral? If I were to know myself, care for myself, and trust that I am capable for doing what is best for me that my relationship with another would be different - from stuckness to expansion, from blame to seeing, and from fighting to cooperation.

Scott Peck says in his book that forgiveness is the stopping of the blame game. I see that until then I will hold on to blame as a shield protecting my own vulnerabilities. But the forgiveness process only manifests for real if it comes from within, through forgiving myself for the experiences, emotions and feelings that I have created inside myself and where I accepted the dissatisfaction, stuckness, confusion and the desire for a freedom outside me to take over.

In my next blog I will share the process that I am starting to walk through Self-Forgiveness in relation to blame ... Stay tuned.

Recommended Interviews: 

Blame: The Design

Blame: From Beginning to End

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DAY 144: Being my own boss - from self-judgments to self-direction

When it comes to business, my experience has been very much based on working for someone else, having objectives established by someone else and following a struture that has been designed by someone else. The fact that all of this framework is pre-existent allows me to dive into do my job and know exactly what to do and when to do the tasks but the picture changes when one ownes a business or starts a business. I began to understand the dynamics of being one's own boss in my experience of being married with an entrepreneur however, what my reality has been allowing me to recently see is that I am my own boss as well - in who I am, in what I do and in how I direct my life.

Who to put the blame on when there is no one else to blame?

The above question came up after walking the points that I will be describing today. This afternoon I noticed that there was some sort of hesitation before I said the magic words "why didn't you do that" and "I was expecting you to give me some direction" and, even though these words still came out of my mouth, the discomfort in m body was here and I had no choice than bringing this point to myself and investigate where my reaction was coming from. Since I started this process of self-investigation I have been dealing with projections - these are thoughts usually echoed towards another but are actually about my own relationship with myself. So, instead of bringing my husband to the equation, I can now see that the frustration was already in me before I put it out against him - the inner-dialogue should then read "why didn't I do that" and "I was expecting something different from me".

The reality is that I haven't yet fully embraced my responsibility of directing me, whether is in my personal life, relationships or in my professional career. In this blog, I will assist me in moving beyond the polarity of judging myself to actually help me understanding this point of self-direction.

Last month I went through very important steps in my process of facing my fears, beliefs and self-trust when it comes to taking decisions in my life. These decisions have to do with giving me direction in expanding my skills and my world and I literally stepped out of my comfort zone in order to walk my decision. There was a lot of "glue" sticking me back to my seat and the mind was constantly sending me reminders of past experiences or of other people's experiences that could easily pushed me back to the comfort zone where I know how things work. It took me time and assistance from friends to put my two feet on the ground, place one in front of the other and start walking slowly but surely into the new challenge ahead.

So, what have been the main points and take-aways from being my own boss? Firstly, that there is no one to blame, not even me; there is no one to compete with, not even with me; there are no valid reactions, not even my own or against me. To give an example of how to walk out of the mind cycle of blame-competition-judgment, I will write about the relationship with myself when things go slower than how I had initially planned (regarding this I recommend the blog article "When Plans Don't Work Out As Planned"). As many might be familiar with this pattern, the tendency is to give into frustration, anger and eventually giving up of one's decision to continue the project. In order to correct this tendency, the notion of time and the relationship with time require an alignment if one wants to use the clock to support the business rather to destroy it. What I mean by this is instead of trying to impose certain timeframes (or should I say bomb-clocks) onto oneself, one must give time to see what works and what doesn't and how long things really take. The mind can play tricks when it comes to beliefs and expectation of how long it will take to start bearing the fruits. I am not saying that having an end-goal is not supportive however, one might get obcessed with the projected results without actually being here and taking each and every required step that eventually create the long-waited and deserved results.

This process of walking a process being it towards professional or personal development goals implies self-direction through which one keeps self engaged with the long-run objective while at the same time deals with real-time points that need to be solved and that will unfold the rest of the journey. No matter where one is in one's process, every single action is part of the big picture and one has the ability to enhance that big picture to become the best that one can ever create for oneself.

This blog title mentions the process of moving from self-judgement to self-direction and the reason for such transition has to do with the realisation that it is the self-judgment that holds oneself back from one's own ability to direct and decide for oneself.  I realise that self-judgments can be great tools to get to know my mind and to understand why I do things in certain ways but that's it! If self-judgments are having any other impact in my life and if I accept these thoughts to play out for many days, that is a redflag informing me that I am not directing myself to walk my decision fully. For as long as I am stuck in self-judgments there is not space for self-correction and this is the sticky glue that can hold me back in the comfort zone because as soon as I step out of it, I will be facing new points that can only be overcomed in self-trust and in self-correction. If one tries to walk through the decision held back to self-judgments than self won't be fully present, won't stand and will fall. This is why at Desteni we walk our process of understanding how the mind works and what the mind shows us through the thoughts that we have about ourselves so that one can direct the thoughts in a constructive way to create one's future differently than how the past has been.

Finally, it is worth reminding me that self-judgment is an energy, just like any other emotion that usually comes along, such as fear and anxiety. New business or new work places and new people can be perceived as scary situations because we are facing first and foremost our own selves through the thoughts that pop up (Will they like me? What impression will they have of me? Will I feel OK in this place? Will I be able to succeed?). As often happens, questions lead to new questions but the same happens with the answers - once I start working out a solution to one point, the domino effect will unfold towards new solutions to my life whereby I will help me in understanding why I am anxious about what other people think of me, or why I would not enjoy myself in that new place, or why on earth would I sabotage my own decision!

 I associate this moment in my life to the opening of the Pandora's Box mentioned in a recent interview that explains why is that the moments of change are great gifts in one's process of self-discovery and self-change. This is the power of Living in self-direction when self-judgments are stopped, understood, forgiven and let go.

In the next post I will walk specific Self-Forgiveness in regards to self-judgments and the fear of not succeeding.

Photo credit: SinRL

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DAY 126: Headache, Despair and Stress

Usually I tend to give a context related to my life before I apply my Self-Forgiveness, however tonight I realise that the context is irrelevant since the stress point can be very wide and affect us in many different ways. Actually, I have been planning to write about a point that came up recently related to chronic stress, when I was made aware by my homeopath that I was manifesting earlier symptoms of such condition that affects both the mind and the body. Since then, I have been reading about it, I met people that went/are going through it and I have been supporting myself through writing and self-awareness, dealing with my mood changes and the polarity of excitement VS depression.

To start with, I recommend reading the "Shock, Trauma and Stress: DAY 479" and the "Shock, Trauma and Stress (Part Two): DAY 480" to understand the processes involved on the Quantum Physical level that contribute to the manifestation of chronic stress in the Mind and Body. Tomorrow I will also be sharing some perspectives on Chronic Stress during my participation at the Desteni I Process LIVE hangout.

On today's post I will apply the Self-Forgiveness on the experience of despair that I have been going through today associated to a strong headache.

Self-Forgiveness:

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to feel desperate when I am with a headache because of the apparent idea that I am powerless towards it to stop it.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to use the headache to feed the fear of having a disease that could potentially be life threatening.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to think of me as a victim of the headache without actually taking responsibility for the origin of the headache. I am aware that if exists within me it is because I have created it.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to go into the state of dispair and impacience within me when I am with a aheadache, which I see comes from the self-judgment for not being able to move myself as fast or as enthusiastic as I usually do.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to blame the headache for the discomfort I feel in my head instead of embracing myself and work with what is here in order to find the root of the pain.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to complain about the headache and to blame my job for the stress that I create within me, without realising that I am distracting myself from the origin point that I must look at and take responsibility for. I notice that today, despite the strong headache throughout the whole day, I have been aware of my thoughts and therefore I can support myself to deal with the thoughts and give me direction to forgive the thoughts and realise that I am able to stop the thoughts.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to hold on to thoughts about the things that I must do and then create this pressure in myself based on the fear of forgetting to do something at work or at home. I realise that this pressure can be avoided if I write down my tasks or if I simplify the task. I also have been realising that my mind tends to complicate things but when I de-constructed into smaller tasks these are not as big or complicated.

Self-Correction statements:

When and as I see myself getting stressed about having a headache, I stop and I breathe. I realise that I am creating this stress dose unto myself unnecessarily because I am not supporting myself to get stable. This is actually an excellent opportunity to stand for and by myself in order to remind myself that I must stop the stress and breathe; that I must support myself unconditionally and that I am responsible for creating the headache in first place.

When and as I see myself fearing headaches based on the fear of being sick and the fear that the headache won't stop, I stop and I breathe. I realise that the headache is not something separated from me and therefore I cannot disregard it or judge it. It is actually my responsibility to cooperate with my own self so that I find what is causing the headache and I help myself through the process of changing myself.

When and as I see myself blaming my job or the people around me for the stress and despair that I am feeling, I stop the thoughts of blame and I breathe. I realise that while typing this sentence I saw the fear of failure coming up, which is a point that I have been accumulating within me with no reason. I see that the fear of failure won't avoid things to fail because I am actually not standing totally clear and unconditional in my actions, as fear corrupts self-honesty.

When and as I see myself giving in to the self-victimisation pattern when I feel pain in my head, I stop myself and I breathe. I realise that I don't have to feel/become/behave like a victim of my own headache. Instead, I can give myself direction to rest, to lay down, to slow down in order to help myself physically and, once I am stable, to help myself by walking the points in my mind manifested during/by the headache.

When and as I see myself using the headache as an excuse to be lazy or to be self-dishonest, I stop and I breathe. I realise that being self-honest is the key to support myself and that by not being self-honest I am just harming my self. For example, when and as I see myself saying to myself that I am not going to write because I have a headache, I stop and I look into the justification, I check within me why I am not going to write and in that moment I can decide to rest first and to write after, making sure that I am not running away from my responsibility to support me and change the relationship with myself - from self-judgment to self-cooperation.

Self-Correction commitments:

I commit myself to remind myself to stand stable in moments when the headache seems to be overwhelming.

I commit myself to relax, to slow myself down and to give me time to investigate what triggered the headache within me and what are the points that come up from this experience so that I can stop participating in it, walk the self-forgiveness and change the relationship with myself.

I commit myself to stop the fear of failure within me and to be calm when dealing with challenges in my life, being at work when something changes at last minute, or when new events happen in my personal/family life. I realise that I can be proactive within me to see what is the problem and to work on a solution, which occurs in common sense and self-honesty, not through reactions.

I commit myself to embrace the headache as a moment where I can only stand for myself and cooperate with my own self, to not give up on myself but to actually support me, both physically through resting and mentally by walking/investigating the layers of the mind through Self-Forgiveness and Self-Realization. I realise that only in self-stability, self-honesty and in standing by the Principle of doing what is Best for All it will be possible to recreate long-lasting solutions for myself and others, being at work, at home or in the society.

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DAY 124: From Reaction to Understanding... and finally the commitment to Change

Something happened at work and I started building up a reaction within me. I felt that I had been thrown under the bus because I had not been informed about all the details of the task ahead.
I could see the thoughts, I could see the blame towards another, I could feel the anxiety in my body - regardless of all these indications, I projected my reaction onto another..

The problem:

I believed that this reaction was real and that I had the right to be angry. I accepted and allowed myself to be the victim and therefore I behaved as such. In that moment, I gave in to the mind and allowed the spin of thoughts to bombard my reality, manifested in my tone of voice, my body movement, my resistance to hear another person's explanations, the desire to be recognised as "right". I could see the righteousness mood in me, based on the belief that I was right and the other was wrong, that I could have done things differently and that the other was to blame.

In all of this internal hurricane there was no time or will for self-forgiveness. I was full with thoughts and reactions and, even though I just wanted to leave the place, I also wanted to stay, under the pressure of speaking up and making sure that my  point was heard.

At night, I opened up these points in a chat with my husband and by then I was open to hear him. His perspective was clear, in common sense and supported me to see what I had just created inside of me and in my reality. He was telling me the truth that I had not given myself the time and the space to tell to myself - even though I knew it. 

It was clear now that I had seen the problem but I had ignored the solution. I could have stopped the reaction within me but, under the mind effect I thought that I had to put it out for the world to see that I was angry and that things were not OK. That I was not OK.

But why?

Now I ask myself: - why do I want others to know that I am not OK. Will that help me? How can others help me if I am not even willing to help myself, to understand myself, to forgive myself and to change the relationship with my own self?

My husband asked me: Why did you not communicate with your team that you needed help? 

The point of communication was something that I did not consider. In my mind I thought that I should know something and that, because I did not know what to do, I thought I was the problem (which was not far from the point but I was judging myself instead of investigating the root of the problem)!

Self-Forgiveness:

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to build up the energetic reaction within me and to feed it with the idea and belief that I am a victim in the whole story.

I forgive myself for not having accepted and allowed myself to stop in the moment and to breathe until I stabilise myself.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to believe that I would feel better after I put my thoughts out so that the other recognises my point.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to want the other to feel guilty about what has done, which I now see that I was being spiteful and mean.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to believe that my reaction can stop when I see the reward of "being right" when in self-honesty there is nothing to be proud of in the patterns of blame and righteousness.

I forgive myself for not having accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that I am the one feeding and participating in these patterns and therefore I am responsible for creating separation towards another being.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to think that if I had stayed silence the other would repeat this point - now I see that this situation is not new and that I cannot change another. The only thing that I can change is me and my relationship to myself and to the world/others.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to fear to say that I did not know something, but instead tried to hide my lack of knowledge. I realise that I put too much effort into covering things up instead of being direct about what is really going on, without going into the reaction or self-judgment.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to judge me as the problem for not knowing how to do something at work and to project the problem towards others, instead of first dealing with my own self-judgment, stop it and then raise awareness for the lack of communication in the team.

Therefore,

When and as I see myself in a situation that is new to me and that I start blaming another for placing me in such place, I stop the blame and I breathe. Instead of trying to justify my own reaction I see that I can simply stop, speak with another and understand what is the plan and what I should do in that new situation.

I realise that the reason why I did not ask for help was because I thought that would be a sign of failure and because I thought that I should be able to know what to do. However, it is not a problem not to know something because I can ask to those that know/the people involved in the project for longer.

When and as I see myself putting pressure on me to get a solution magically without actually knowing what to do, I stop this idea that "I must know" and I simply investigate, I speak with those that know and I gather the information that is required for me to understand the problem and to know its solution.

When and as I see myself speaking all the thoughts that run wild in my mind in deliberate spitefulness and blame towards another, I stop and I breathe. I realise that I am responsible for stopping the spitefulness within me and this world.

When and as I see myself building up a reaction, the self-distrust and sense of powerlessness because I don't know something, I stop the reaction and I breathe. I realise that my self-trust must not come from any knowledge but from the realisation that I stand for myself no matter what, and that I am my own solution to whatever happens inside me, being it thoughts, reactions, nervousness, the voice tonality and the physical tiredness.

I realise that I must not fall into the mind of fear and self-judgment but that each moment is an opportunity for me to recreate myself outside of my programme and start speaking in pure common sense. I realise that saying that I don't know when I am not familiar with something it is an opportunity to be humble and to stand confident unconditionally. I realise that I don't define myself by the knowledge I have. Therefore, instead of using my knowledge as a way to promote myself, I can and must apply my understanding of how my mind works in my current daily job and be practical to find/create my own solutions.

Self-corrective statements:

I commit myself to deliberately stop the reaction within me and to make the decision to not participate in the reaction anymore. I realise that I am creating my own physical exhaustion and physical self-destruction, which is unacceptable in my process of becoming LIFE, not giving in to Death.

I commit myself to embrace the moment when I feel unstable and to realise that this is the moment where I live the decision to empower myself by creating myself differently, not within reaction or blame, but within self-awareness, self-reconciliation, self-respect, patience, care and understanding. 

I commit myself to understand what is going on in that specific situation at work, the lack of information and the miscommunication , and from this point I lead the process of creating a solution where each people involved can participate and is empowered to do so. I realise that blame and guilt are destructive elements whereas self-honesty and equality (all equally responsible) is empowering. Once this is understood, our common direction will lead to solutions.

I commit myself to not allow myself being spiteful nor to behave in spitefulness, as none of this leads to solution - only separation and conflict.

I commit myself to keep my reality simple without the idea that I should know something that will save the whole situation - instead, I realise that each one is equally responsible for the mess of that situation (and this world) and therefore I will stand by the principle of focusing on a solution, within me (e.g. where does the reaction come from) and in my external reality. For that, I will communicate with the others openly, without judgement, without blame, without righteousness, and I investigate until I am satisfied with the information that I have, so that I can actually participate as the solution.

I commit myself to stop the blame towards another whenever I feel myself as the victim - I realise that this is a self-judgment and that I am the one defining me as the victim and feed the circle of self-limitation each time I blame another. My self-stability is never dependent on another's words or actions, because I decide who I am and who I want to be in my existence in this world. If I believe that I am a victim, I will behave as such. Therefore, I commit myself to stand equal to another and realise that each of us is an individual responsible for one's words and actions.

I commit myself to stand stable in my decision to not blame another, to not feel guilty, to not accept being a victim of my own mind/reactions or a victim of others.

I commit myself to invest my energy and time into bringing about the solution, in my thoughts, words and deeds.

  

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DAY 123: Facing a REACTION - The Past Me and the New Me

Today I faced who I have been within a reaction - my old me that I visited again: I was nervous, stressed, could not think properly, I wanted to blame another and, despite of all the signs, I still wanted to justify this state of mind.  This time, however, there was a moment where the energy of the reaction was so deliberately strong that made me stop and see what I was doing to myself. Being aware of the pattern of reaction within me supported me to slow down and take a decision: the decision to not allow this consequence in my Life anymore - the decision to become the solution instead of feeding the problem - The decision to change who I am in the Present and, therefore, my Future.

So what was the problem?

The problem was that I could not find my tube card - for about 2 minutes I searched for it while trying to call my husband to check if he knew where the card was. After about 5 minutes I went into the experience of rush because I would be late for work. I kept on trying to contact my husband but he did not pick up.  I was literally on my own and it became clear that no one else could help me:  the same way that giving in into the mind-reaction in blame, anger and self-victimisation was also my creation. I noticed that it has been a long time since the last time I went into this stressful state of "fighting against the clock" and having my plans being delayed by an unexpected issue. It was also being accumulated by other small points that now seemed to be extremely big and justifying my belief of self-victimisation.

The Solution:

I decided to leave a voice mail on my husband's phone and in that moment I noticed the anger in my voice and the energy came up in a hiccup. In that moment, I dropped the call and I stopped - I physically stopped myself in the room and took a breath. I said to myself something like: "this situation is unacceptable - I am creating this experience to myself, I see that. I must become my solution. Blaming another for taking my card is not helping in any way so why do I do it? Instead, what can I actually do at the moment to make sure that I leave on time for work?"  From this moment, the whole scene changed. Instead of feeding the blame towards my husband, I directed my attention into a practical solution. Interestingly enough, I opened up my wallet again and I saw a backup card that I could use for the train too! Before, I remember to check my wallet and I could not see it even though it was there all the time! This says a lot about the whole blindness driven by the blame and reaction projected onto other people.

The reward:

The unexpected experience that before could have potentially conditioned and limited my day, I realise that it was a transcendance point within me that I was able to understand where it was coming from and how I could change myself and my reality. The deliberate change of attitude towards my reaction can work as a future reference to keep on applying my self-correction in every moment.

When my husband called me back a few minutes later, I could still recognise the traces of blame and anger in my communication even though I had already found a solution. In the end, my husband informed me that unfortunately the card had been left  in his jacket's pocket by mistake, and I reacted again. So additional points that I must look at are: - why do I want the other to see that I am reacting? What is reaction going to do to the other? Why do I believe that by reacting with another this is going to prevent the same point happening in the future?

When I left the bus I was physically stable within me, walking firm in my decision to not allow this experience to define the rest of my day. I took the tube and I wrote about this experience, about the point of blame, the spitefulness of reacting towards another in my communication and the desire to blame the other to justify the emotional energy, instead of stopping the reaction within me. I then realised that the reaction is of the past and of the present, but not necessarily of the future as long as I don't create/feed it. In self-honesty, it is my responsibility to become aware of the reaction, to breathe through the energy, to stop it from being projected and to release in from within, through self-forgiveness, breathing, writing and living the decision to breakthrough a pattern that otherwise could easily contaminate me and the reality around me.

 The old-reaction pattern was for the first time replaced by a real-time change in the way I saw the problem, I saw the solution and I decided to become it - embracing the New me that I am responsible for creating.

Art work by JL Kenney

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DAY 110: Self-responsibility during the storm - blinded by the fear and blame

The point of not embracing completely my responsibility for my acceptances and allowances came across when dealing with the point of blame. When I was younger, I remember to copy or agree with what another did or said until something went wrong and then my mind went automatically into blaming the other for my experience. The "funny" thing is that I could not find the blame point until now, however it is manifested in thoughts and backchats throughout my whole life. Probably, because I was educated to not blame another, I don't do it in front of the others or say "it was his/her fault"! But inside, there is a point of blame that I have been distracted by… and therefore missing THE point of self-responsibility.

I came across this point tonight, in the middle of a lightning storm, after my husband telling me to go with him to another place so we could see the lightning better. In my mind I feared leaving the house and crossing the garden to reach the other building - obviously it was the fear of death by getting struck by a lightning. I was having a conflict in my mind  because I was not taking the decision for myself but defining that moment as a pressure on me. Even though he was informing me that it was safe to walk that short distance, my imagination was already far far away… and the image that I was having was about me going behind my husband and being hit by a lightning.  

By bringing this point to myself I can see how I was blaming him for anything bad that could happen, when in fact, it was going to be always my decision to cross the garden - it was my legs walking, it was me breathing, it was me directing me. The fear was showing me all of these but all I could see was the fear in itself. I was blinded by the fear, not by the tropical lightning.

By investigating a childhood memory, I can see the blame pattern. When I was about 4 years old, I was playing a game with my sister (older than me) who at some point asked me if I wanted to go fast or slowly - I said fast and there we go: we both fell and I harmed myself in my mouth because I had the baby pacifier on. I can see that there were some elements that I did not take into consideration, such as our age difference, our different strength and physical conditions. Probably with 4 years old the point of self-responsibility was not yet understood however only today I was able to relate this experience to the tendency to live another's decision instead of embracing that decision as myself, as who I am in that moment, and take care of me to make sure that my decision is the best for me.

The other person is a facilitator but is not forcing me to do anything. If I walk or if I say something, it is time to be fully aware of the words I speak and the direction I take. There are so many elements that play out that I can only be aware of what happens within me, so this is a point to practice from now on. 

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to believe that another knows more what I want to do or knows what is best for me more than I do about myself.

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to get distracted with the point of blaming another for my own experience of fear instead of giving me the moment to investigate my fear and to walk the decision by myself. 

I forgive myself for having accepted and allowed myself to relate the other person to my experience of fear (e.g. to my husband for inviting me to go out, my sister for suggesting going fast) when in fact I created the fear experience inside myself, I imagined the images in my mind, I took the decision to participate in the game and I was the one resisting to take responsibility for myself.

I forgive myself for not having accepted and allowed myself to embrace my self-responsibility as all that I must do for myself as the Life that I am.

When and as I see myself believing that the other person is responsible for my decision because the idea of going somewhere came from the other person, I stop and I breathe. I realise that whatever I do or whatever I say is a manifestation of my acceptances and allowances in my mind, therefore, I commit myself to re-establish my relationship with myself in fully responsibility, so that I stand as an example of self-responsibility to myself and I support myself to be fearless when it comes to take a decision - I  support myself to trust my decision unconditionally and for that I commit myself to look at the present moment in self-awareness, in investigating the various options I have, in being flexible with myself and being my own solution in every moment. 

When and as I see myself going into my mind of imagination, fear and anticipation, I stop and I breathe. I realise that participating in the mind won't support me in dealing with the physical reality and that I must let go of the thoughts that are limiting my expression.

I am starting to see what is means to be hard on myself because the mind limits my expression every time I go into the imagination and anticipation, literally imposing an image unto my reality that is not the best for me.

Therefore, I support myself in slowing the mind down through breath in order to see that I have the ability and the responsibility to create myself here, in self-awareness and not copying what is going on in my mind or in the minds of others. For that, I commit myself to communicate with another to assess the options available and I commit myself to walk my decision in self-awareness, self-trust and enjoying living myself in self-responsibility in every moment.

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